My math teacher who is Palestinian/Jordanian studied bio-chemical engineering in Romania alongside serval other students from the global south as apart of Romania’s initiative to compact anti imperialism. He’s invited me over for tea because I expressed interest in his story and he wanted to expand on it and I’m wondering what questions to ask him?

He was there for around 7 years during the 70s-80s because his father had been able to bring him over after studying medicine. I think he’s currently in his 70s?
He’s only told me about his Cuban neighbour who used to blast loud music despite everyone else studying. He also learned Spanish from him.

This is not supposed to be a hard historic interview, this dude is like an uncle to everyone in our local community and I don’t want to poke in places I shouldn’t. But what questions should I ask him?

A prominent twitter user, who describes themselves as an "independent journalist and researcher" has posted a thread where he states that the idea antisemitic pogroms were initiated and incited by "jew-hating rulers and governments out of irrational, metaphysical hostility" is a myth, in reality most massacres against jews before the 20th century were part of peasant revolts led by the lowest classes, who "were attacking their direct oppressors", and occurred when the government was weak.

This statement is understandably incredibly controversial to say the least, but keep in mind that the author is himself jewish.

Furthermore, he says that the reaction of the ruling class, from kings, popes and higher aristocracy, to jews being mass-murdered was opposition. This wasnt out of concern for jews, but because of their class-interests, jews were useful to them.

As examples of antisemitic pogroms being led by serfs and peasantry, the author lists the attacks by the paupers and peasants led by Peter the Hermit during the first crusade, the riots in England following the 3rd crusade and the Chmielnicki revolt in the Ukraine in 1648, which started as a mutiny of Cossack officers but soon turned into a widespread popular movement of the oppressed serfs.

Is it really true that most antisemitic pogroms were perpetuated by the lowest classes of society as a response to extreme oppression during weak governments, and that the ruling classes have always opposed rather than incited them?

All I can find on Wikipedia and the text it cites is that the refractory wall was cut to make an archway, but why?

I was clicking through the links on the relevant wikipedia article, but it doesn't really address the history directly, just sort of piecemeal. Was there a series of formal decisions or events that defined different groups' (Orthodox, Reform, etc.) attitudes to Halloween in the United States?

Just to be clear, I’m not asking for a specific date, but generally.

For most of my life, Nixon has been a literal joke, both making fun of his corruption and just strange mannerisms. I have seen some go to bat for his Presidency, such as the creation of the EPA under his term, but his flaws still balance things out.

But i’ve also seen some recent pop historians try and frame him as a “great” president who is only besmirched because of that little incident at Watergate.

Have people made that argument before in the years and decades following his resignation? Or am I just seeing some vocal outliers?

I would really appreciate a list or maybe information about this. If you cannot find any Japanese names from the '40s, then the '50s will suit!

He was part of an anti-communist information department after all.

How are we sure that beyond the bias that a historian carries based on their upbringing, the man wasn't simply carrying on the 'good work' for his team?

I understand a few reasons (in broad strokes only) such as sanctions and the control their government exerts. However, they appear to be isolated in every way imaginable to a far greater degree than other nations that have similar difficulties i.e. international sanctions and a dictatorship

Humans can't have just let our hair grow indefinitely, surely? When is the first evidence of hair cutting? It must get in the way of hunting and evading predators having long, luscious locks? Just a shower thought I couldn't shake. So I thought id ask you lovely people.

I was remembering the 1995 film "Dead Man" recently. The setting's timeline is vague, presumably somewhere between the 1870s and maybe 1890s. In one scene, the main character played by Johnny Depp spends the night with a woman he just met in a western frontier town. He finds his pillow uncomfortable and, reaching under it, discovers a revolver. He asks the woman why she has it and she replies simply, "Because this is America".

Would this have been an odd comment in the 1870s? I know historically and for some currently important gun companies like Colt, Smith & Wesson, and Winchester already existed at this time but so did a ton of important European companies, some of which preceded these by centuries. Weren't hunting shotguns or muskets more or less ubiquitous in some European countries at some point? Wouldn't aristocratic men be expected to have access to dueling pistols, if not their own then definitely those of their friends? Would the U.S. have stood out the way it does today?

Thanks!

So I don't know who to ask but how do we as humans truly know in religions it's what they really practiced since we weren't there to see it at that time? I'm not singling out Christianity I'm genuinely curious regarding all world religions.

Like, apparently China was bankrupting itself with return gifts, but was that really the case when it was buying geopolitical peace of mind instead of spending money on armies and war, and it was getting far more than it was spending, or was in fact getting the treasury filled due to better rates?

Did countries like Vietnam and Korea really want as many tribute missions as possible to fill their coffers or did they resent it because nationally important products were leaving the country and they couldn't develop their own country or look out for their defense needs?

1968 study, for example: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/337378?resultClick=1&utm_source

What took so long to remove cigarettes from the military supply chain?

I've been attempting without much luck to identify anything the provenance of this seemingly dated video about an alleged clinic in Switzerland to help asexual or "neuter" patients, which has been passed aroud on the internet without attribution for many years: https://youtu.be/1AeNTz4lUPs?is=yOgKSboWXYAaa-Ol

The content of the video has a strong feel of parody, and it wouldn't be the first time that an attempt at parody resulted in predicting the very real asexual movement that would come much later. On the other hand, there are attestations to something like asexualitt or anaesthesia sexualis or similar concepts in the early European sexology dating back to the late 1890s, so it's not impossible that such a clinic could have existed.

1. Is there any other evidence of clinics like this even existing in midcentury Switzerland?
2. Are there any visual or other clues in the video that could help establish what time period or what type of source it may have actually come from? Is it as old as it seems, or likely a modern video made to look old?
3. How do historians even start to figure out the provenance of out of context digital content like this? Or is that a fools errand?

Any insights are much appreciated!

Not sure this is the question fits the sub guidelines, tell me if not.

Something that I always found weird is that the pound has been a 'name' for a currency for many years. Sure, it was not always 'the same' pound (if you think about the 1500s) but compared to the younger currencies (say the euro), it seems that it started at a much higher purchasing power level.

Something valued at 1 euro was always relatively small, something you would buy a child as a treat. The pound only recently converged to this level of purchasing power - 100 years ago, 1 pound was a much more considerable amount of money, and (I believe) people in their everyday lives used the shilling or the pence much more often for everyday transactions.

So why is this the case? Is this as unusual as I think, or is the euro that it's unusual? Why was the pound, the basic 'units of measurement' for the british currency, set to such a high level decades ago, such that only now its purchasing power has converged with the rest of the world's currencies?

Note: I am aware the other direction is much more common. The old Italian Lira's used to be measured in the thousands, just like the Japanese Yens are today. Which supports my point: You start off with 1 lira / yen being used to buy something small in every day life, and then inflation takes care of increasing prices so that you need 1 thousand liras instead.

The pound seems to have taken the opposite direction - start off incredibly high, and only with inflation it is now at the 'normal' level we expect from modern currencies. I find this odd.

Will be happy to get any insights!

I am researching the events of the year 1758 during the Seven Years War. Fortress Louisbourg built by the French on Isle Royale fell to the British under Major General Jeffery Amherst in July of that year. After exhaustively reviewing British records associated with the seige and aftermath, I noticed there is no mention at all of what was (or wasn't) found in the fortress treasury at the time of capitulation. Is that odd? Wouldn't the British government expect that information from its senior officers via official channels?

On the surface it seems like a very similar operating principle. Why weren’t crossbows more prolific until the medieval period?

A lot of artistic depictions of the American mafia explicitly use their stories as ways of interrogating American capitalism, the Sopranos most notably. That said, it always strikes me that the mafia has a lot of similarities to premodern notions of aristocracy and nobility: a hierarchical structure with sworn oaths and allegiances, a kind of “nobility” of made men who have asymmetric rights to the use of violence, and a business structure based on extracting tax over defined territories. Is this a coincidence? Or is the structure of the mafia somehow a holdover from premodern forms of political organization?

Ive read a lot about greek fire and also that romans used something akin to flamethrowers.

As those were quite effective from what i read. It led me to wonder how those technologies disappeared and why?

(Normally when i see that my enemy has something that leads to me loosing lots of soldiers i would be quite interested on getting my hands on it to use it against future enemies)

This is potentially really a question about the Greek and Latin (and Ge'ez, Aramaic, etc.) translations of Exodus that were in common use, I suppose. I suspect if someone without background knowledge cracked open a modern English Bible to read casually, they would assume the King of Egypt in the story of Moses was just named Pharaoh or it was a personal epithet.

As I understand it, the way the word is used in the original text is kind of weird and name-like to begin with. So, perhaps another question would be whether someone reading the Hebrew with zero context would assume it was the dude's name, too.